583 Quotes by Truman Capote

No one will ever know what ‘In Cold Blood’ took out of me. It scraped me right down to the marrow of my bones. It nearly killed me. I think, in a way, it did kill me.

Nothing is more usual than to feel that others have shared in our failures, just as it is an ordinary reaction to forget those who have shared in our achievements.

Flannery O’Connor had a certain genius. I don’t think John Updike has, or Norman Mailer or William Styron, all of whom are talented, but they don’t exceed themselves in any way. Norman Mailer thinks William Burroughs is a genius, which I think is ludicrous beyond words. I don’t think William Burroughs has an ounce of talent.

But it’s Sunday, Mr. Bell. Clocks are slow on Sundays.

I don’t mean I’d mind being rich and famous. That’s very much on my schedule and someday I’ll try to get around to it.

I could leave the world with today in my eyes.

I knew damn well I’d never be a movie star. It’s too hard; and if you’re intelligent, it’s too embarrassing.

She looked at me blankly, and rubbed her nose, as though it tickled; a gesture, seeing often repeated, I came to recognize as a signal that one was trespassing. Like many people with a bold fondness for volunteering intimate information, anything that suggested a direct question, a pinning-down, put her on guard.

I couldn’t understand a sense of unease that multiplied until I could hear my heart beating.